Lost in Transition
by unsedated
Summary: At times we forget that we are shackled by our griefs that we forget to live. AU.


**Shannara isn't mine.**

When Wil Ohmsford was young, other boys found him queer. The girls and ladies found him sweet. The men found him gentlemanly (aside from his father, who would have thought similarly if he were present or if he were sober enough).

He grew up eating the produce from his mother's well-loved garden. In the mornings, he would join his mother dig on soil and plant new seeds, or pick up ripened fruits and adequately grown vegetable or water budding plants. Sometimes, his mates from grade school would watch on him and his mother in amazement as they coaxed the earth to bring color inside the borders of their rickety porch. Some would be snickering and throwing jabs at how he would be perpetually dirt-stained and unsightly. Wil simply let their insults pass by; he was never born into money and never born into a stable family.

Despite the poverty of money and his father's love, he thrived in his mother's care and her belief that he is meant to revolutionize heath care after seeing his affinity to the sciences. He aced his classes, and earned scholarships left and right. He joined competitions, and brought fame to the place he spent half his life wandering on aside from their porch. Ultimately, he loved his mother too much, and everything was alright.

But things wouldn't always be easy.

Just as Wil graduated high school, his mother began feeling chest pains that remain unresolved with rest. Her heart is failing, they told him. They gave her months; she lasted for nine of them, enough to see Wil get into a prestigious university that spared his pockets from burning in emptiness.

Then his father appeared.

He hated him viciously, spending his free time and holidays juggling two part-time jobs to scrounge enough money for his daily needs and studying as a means to relax. His father – rather, his assistant, Allanon - would visit him most of the time. The older man did his best to tempt him into coming into his father's house (mansion, cave, whatever he called the godforsaken empty cavern of wood, stones, and cement in the middle of nowhere), yet he refused repeatedly.

He would not be the man his father wanted him to be, not after his absenteeism from his son's life or his indifference concerning his former mistress' last breaths.

* * *

Amberle, on the other hand, had almost everything she wanted.

Growing up with her father's guidance and her uncle Ander's care, she became one of the most promising heiresses of her generation. Her conscience was made of purity and compassion, her mind of diplomacy and kindness. Determined and passionate, Amberle became an ideal heiress to the family's business with her level-headedness and sense of justice.

But she missed her mother – missed the warm caress of her hands when she was woken by childish nightmares, missed her blinding smile when she achieved her goals, missed her unwavering support when her grandfather admonished her for her spontaneity and loyalty to her own causes, missed her unrelenting belief when she achieved her laurels without the help of her family name.

She perished too soon.

She never chose to be a princess, and she would dare the rules if that was her only glimpse of freedom.

She kept on daring until a stormy, December night.

Snow fell like an onslaught that night, the wind howling angrily against the frame of their cabin house. Her father and uncle Ander insisted on spending time their every Christmas season in remembrance of their youth. It was a quiet place away from uncle Arion's seething jealousy or her grandfather Eventine's displeasure with his sons' actions. Amberle saw the appeal, and readily packed her bags and joined their vacation.

His father told her to wait for them. Her uncle Ander's flight had gotten cancelled, and he needed to be fetched at the bus station. The cabin house was more than a few miles away from the town he was dropped on; fetching him was the only way.

They didn't make it back (in time).

Amberle didn't anticipate that it would be the first time she would welcome Christmas by herself.

* * *

 _I know the expression is "lost in translation", but I'm rooting for another idea. I haven't forgetten The Ties, but c'mon, this idea's been pestering me for quite some time already and Shannara's getting better by the minute so why not risk an AU of it. This is be a short story (way shorter than I planned The Ties to be), and I hope you enjoy it. :)_


End file.
